About Eric E. Magnuson

An annotated timeline…

Earliest Memory: 3rd birthday. Received
a pink teddy bear that proved comfortable neither as a pillow nor a companion.

Kindergarten: Lucked my way into finding my first girlfriend and first best friend. Neither link lasted, but both were cherished examples of how these things happen.

Life on the farm was what I knew before anything else came into the frame.

Fifth Grade: Experienced my first real fist
fight with a boy named Roger (REDACTED). Resulted in a draw, a friendship, and
the realization that a handshake among even bitter rivals should always be
sought.

The summer after: Began “punching the time clock”
on my family’s farm – the only job I would know until I left for college.

1980: Supported Ronald Reagan for President in
my 6th Grade Social Studies class mock election. Quoted in an actual
story appearing in our local newspaper as swayed by Reagan’s “strong on
defense” policies. To this day I regret not voting for John Anderson (I-IL).

1981: First time on a plane bigger than my godfather
Dale’s four-seater that he’d land on the fallow fields near his farm. For the
purpose of an actual family vacation in Colorado and Utah. Most notable was
talking my way into my first R-rated movie (“Stripes”). In Park City, UT. Twice!
See Pelting
Out (Chapter 11) for the full story.

1982: The Milwaukee Brewers lost Game 7 of the
World Series to the St. Louis Cardinals, when Bruce Sutter struck out
“Stormin’” Gorman Thomas. I still wear Thomas’s uniform #20 in
misplaced hope of someday reversing this grand karmic injustice.

1984: The popping of collars and growing of
bangs began in earnest for me. As the solitary mohawked-skateboarder in my
hometown would eventually say, I was the most obscenely preppy kid ever spotted
in the wilds of northern Wisconsin.

Summer leadership camp (Badger Boys State) taught very little about politics. But I did have a future Governor as my camp counselor. I won’t give it away…email me if you figure out who and where that Guv is standing both then and now.

1987: The Black Monday stock market crash went
largely unnoticed by me at the time. Blame the first few months of college-level
socializing at the University of Minnesota. I claim this was the last major
news event I missed, thereafter adopting a news junkie habit that has never
softened.

Early 1990s-ish: Began wearing a goatee before
it was cool to do so. The fall of the Soviet Union and the Cold War unravels as
I began the struggle to gain command of the Russian language. In this, the West
most surely lost.

1993: Just as Grunge was about to begin its last
blurry spin into the mosh pit of dashed hopes, I arrived in Seattle for grad
school at the University of Washington. I began to write for whatever format
might pay me enough to live, with an eye toward the longer stories that
journalism hadn’t allowed me the freedom to explore.

1996: What can I say – love changes all things.
I am no exception to this truism. Long distance relationships and grand writing
challenges take form. Leading to…

1998: Embarked upon a two-year stretch in
Dallas, TX. Aside from the heat, it suited me well. For one season of a
suburban Pee Wee Football league, I did both the play-by-play broadcast and
color commentary. In other words, I entered the big time in Big D.

2000: My soon-to-be wife and I moved to Vermont
– the “Wisconsin of the Northeast” – a place we shall always visit and dream of
fondly. While there, I wrote patent applications for a dubious consulting
company and did “opposition research” for a national political campaign.

Photo Courtesy of Jock Sturges

2004: Two years in San Francisco allowed me to
learn how to be a father and to finish my first novel (a thriller set in
Seattle titled Locus Rising – not yet published, but available upon request). San
Francisco is a peach of a place. I did some creative-themed volunteer work
(most satisfyingly with 826 Valencia) and we hated to leave. But then my wife
got the job she’d always wanted…

2006 to 2010: Returned to Seattle as a family. I
began work on and then finished a second novel (also a thriller set in Seattle
titled Return Control Delete – also not yet published, and also
available upon request). Shaved the goatee.

2011 to present: The idea for Pelting
Out: Finding Fur In Our History And Culture blossomed. Began traveling
for research. Lots of other cool stuff happened. But you’ll just need to take
my word on that. Stay tuned…